Species within the family have gelatinous basidiocarps (fruit bodies) that produce spores on septate basidia and, as such, were formerly referred to the "heterobasidiomycetes" or "jelly fungi".

The family was established in 1900 by German mycologist Gustav Lindau to accommodate a single, neotropical species, Hyaloria pilacre.

Lindau considered his new family to be close to the Tremellaceae, but distinguished by the "angiocarpous" or gasteroid development of its fruit bodies (meaning that the spore-bearing hymenia were covered until maturity, rather than exposed).

The Hyaloriaceae were placed within the order Tremellales by most subsequent authors,[1][2][3] until 1984, when American mycologist Robert Joseph Bandoni revised this group of fungi and placed the family within the Auriculariales.

[5] Initial molecular research, based on cladistic analysis of DNA sequences, has supported the placement of the Hyaloriaceae within the Auriculariales and has also supported Wells' placement of the genus Myxarium within the family, though not all genera with "myxarioid" basidia are included.